Daily Independent (Lagos)
3 November 2008
Most streets are littered with different brands of churches and mosques in Nigeria; yet moral decadence appears to be on the increase in our community. Ebongabasi Ekpe-Juda, author of, probably, the latest controversial religious book in town, The Bewitched Church, in this exclusive interview with our Correspondent, Yemi Adebisi, was annoyed with Nigerian pastors who have no balance sermon and those sleeping with their members. He talked about the heap offering, tithing among others and the way the world has swallowed the church. Excerpts:
What brought the inspiration of writing the book?
It came in 2005 when I began to seek the face of God for the evil that I saw happening in the church. There are reports of pastors sleeping with young girls, stealing money and all that. I began to wonder why these were happening. When a couple connived, sold their properties, kept part of the proceeds and brought the remaining to the church. When they were asked whether the amount they brought was the amount the thing was sold, they said yes.
For just saying yes, which was a lie, they were killed. Today, there are so many unprintable things happening in our churches, and people seem to be going scot-free. God gave me a very humorous answer that most of those places, he is not there. If he is there, evil would not thrive. I began to probe. 'But they are called by your name. Church of this and church of that.'
God began to tell me that where lies are told, the person presenting that lie is the devil because he is the father of all lies. So, he cannot be there and be sharing glory with the devil. That he is not in most of those places. God asked me: how many ministry gifts are in the church? I told him it was five but he said no, it is not true. I then read my bible two times as he instructed. I said they are five but he said no. He read it out to me and said they are four. He said where they preach five, who will take the glory? I said Satan because that was what the scripture says. God left after this revelation.
Exactly two months after, God came and asked me of what I have done with what he told me? I told him I am sorry. I then began to share the news round. As I share this, it became clear to me that I cannot reach the whole body of Christ with this thing because other things kept coming. The only way to do it was to put the information in a book that would go to places one may not be able to visit. This book now has gotten to America and here I am in Nigeria. The book is on the net. People would see and read. That was the inspiration for me to write the book to point out that some of what we do in the church are not actually the correct things.
In the past, we have heard so many pastors saying the same thing, that God told them this and that. We cannot see God to confirm whether they heard any thing from Him or not. There was even a pastor that told us God told him he was going to become a president in Nigeria at a particular year but this never be. Another one said a Nigeria president would die if sworn in. How would you prove that yours was from God?
I have said all in the book, that any revelation you cannot align with the bible is not from God. I also said in the book that some people speak, thinking that God confirmed what they have said. But God will distant himself because he didn't send them. When somebody comes and gives a very definitive prophecy that God says I should go and contest election 2007 but did not win shows God never spoke. Like I said in the book, he is suffering from elemental spirit that he allowed to dominate him, thinking that God is going to confirm what he has said.
If God speaks, God is well able to bring to pass what he says. If God speaks like I said in the book, conditionally, saying, if you do this, this will happen, if those conditions are not met, nothing will happen. I can tell you today that there are many 'thus says the lord' in the church today but not from God. They will give account to God on the last day because if you have not heard from God and you say you do, it's a lie. So many lies are being packaged today in churches.
We wait until the last day. Pertaining to your question, I have written in the book that this is what God said to me. It is for somebody to read it and look again at the bible. A friend was asking me that why do you say that tithe should not be paid in church. I said I didn't say this. What I said was that God did not say in the bible, that tithe should be paid in church alone. The bible says you can give your tithe to widow, to stranger and to the orphan.
For goodness sake, that is not the church. I said to the person that we have never preached about heap offering in the church. If God says that all tithes should go to church, why will heap offering be in the bible? Heap offering from what the bible says is a tithe of tithes. What does that mean? If I say to Adebisi, this is my tithe I give it to you. Adebisi is expected to take the ten percent of that to a priest. This is the heap offering. I told this person that if all tithe is to come to church, what will be the position of the heap offering. That means the bible is contradicting itself.
I said to the person I wish God has been able to dilate our hearts to see that tithe involves things like domesticated animals, cow and farm produce. If all tithes are to go to church, then would you go and keep a goat or a cow, cattle, hen, yam or pineapple in the church? That will not be a place of worship. That is why God says you should take it to a store house. A store house comes from the word store and store is not a church.
The person was very angry with me. I told him instead of all these, why don't you take this book, read it, pick your bible and see the references whether what I am saying is true. When a man is born, he is born into a cultural situation. He learns from the culture and acquires certain knowledge from it. After then, he comes to church. Christianity will now come to teach him on things he has known in his culture.
This makes it difficult for Christianity to penetrate because he has formed certain opinions about things. Every Christian must adopt and follow the culture that God gave in the bible. God is the judge of the whole earth. God will bring what he has said to fulfillment. God is not historical.
The bible said we should not judge, but you said in your book that god said we should judge, can you clarify this ambiguity?
Unfortunately the people have not read the bible well. Before now it was the priest alone that has exclusive right to the bible. They accepted what God said and came back to tell us. If you have read the bible well, you will know that truly God said we should judge. But he said when you are judging, you should do a righteous judgment. You don't judge for condemnation.
We should not condemn. We should judge for correction. In your office, don't they do appraisal at the end of the year? Is that not judgment? In your church, don't you judge things when there are contentious? In a position of crisis, the pastor will stand as a judge, what does that mean if you say we should not judge? What he is saying is that the way you judge is the way you will be judged. Why would God appointed judges if he says we shouldn't judge. It is all misunderstanding of biblical concept by us. And that is why this book has come to correct these things.
Why are you annoyed with pastors that curse those who failed to pay their tithe in your book?
I am angry, because they do not understand what the bible says. The bible says you can give your tithe to strangers. Are they churches? If the church sends me to pay my tithe to a particular person and the pastor is angry with me for doing the right thing? In that I am active. There was a girl in my church that was paying her tithe to a particular church at Ibadan.
My area pastor was calculating that this person should pay tithe and that person should pay too. The bible says we should leave administration of daily giving and all of that and concentrate on the word and prayer. That should be the focus of the pastors. That is another spirit. I have put the consequences of not tithing in the book.
What I am saying is that it is ungodly and unbiblical, the emphasis placed on tithe. Some pastors have gone to tell their congregation that if they don't pay their tithe they will die suddenly. Haba! How do you do that kind of a thing. Does God eat tithe? It is meant for those people who work in the job. A pastor rented apartment for his pastors as I said in the book. When he had money, he moved to an eyebrow area in Victoria Island.
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